Rhubarb Lactopickles for Spring!

Pinks and greens make this rhubarb pickle perfect for spring. How-to on the whey ricotta pictured coming next week!

I’m nowhere near done with cheese, but you have to put something on your cheese tray besides cheese, right? And I don’t want you all to miss out on your spring pickles! By the time I’m done with cheese, rhubarb and aspargus will be all gone until next year in Philly, so here you go: a simple, spring recipe.

If you regularly read this blog, you’ll know that I recommend pickles as an excellent fermentation starting point. Why? They are nearly foolproof if you know a few rules! The first and most important trick is picking the right vegetables. There are a few things I haven’t been able to get to work well, many others that work well with some tweaks, and a ton that work with very little effort. The second key is submersion. If your veggies are submerged under brine, that gives you the anaerobic conditions that are necessary for the LAB to thrive. The third rule is temperature, room temp works great! Get below 65ish degrees and we’re talking some serious sluggishness and potential that the bacteria never get kicking. Above 80 or so, things might start to ferment too quickly, or it may get too hot for your LAB to start their happy processes.

So here’s one that’s super easy and popping up at the farmer’s markets all over town at the moment: rhubarb! As always, with pickles, feel free to change out the seasonings for what you have on hand or what you prefer. I actually think these rhubarb pickles would be great with nothing but salt. The tangy, fruity notes of fresh rhubarb can stand alone!

I got these veggies at my local farmer’s market at Headhouse Square. It is operated by the renowned Food Trust, a local organization dedicated to eradicating food deserts and educating kids on their food choices. I’m pretty proud that they call Philly home and I’m grateful for the local bounty that they, and a couple other wonderful organizations to bring into the city.

Pretty rhubarb pickles will have pink brine!

Rhubarb Pickles

yields about 1 quart of rhubarb pickles

fermentation time will be approximately 2 weeks

I usually make my single quart batches of pickles while I’m preparing another meal. I already have the cutting board out, so it really adds no time to dinner prep and the payoff is pretty huge!

Room temperature brine (I make mine by stirring 1 T of salt into 2 c water until dissolved)

How-To

1. Place all ingredients except brine into a 1 quart jar making sure that your bay leaf stays whole. You may layer in your mustard seeds and bay leaf for visual effect, but I have not found that their position in the jar influences flavor

2. Pour brine into jar, ensuring that there is enough liquid in which to submerge your rhubarb

Hi Cindy,
Sorry I missed your comment. Green garlic is just spring garlic, long stems still attached. It looks a lot like garlic at the base, it’s just that the cloves aren’t fully differentiated from one another (you’ll see them when you slice it). It isn’t as pungent as garlic, but still provides a great, garlicky taste. I sometimes grow garlic and that’s a great way to get them cheap. Otherwise, it’s off to the farmer’s market!
Let me know how your pickles turn out!
Amanda

Any salt will do! I like to use sea salt because it has a higher mineral content and the fermentation process makes minerals more bioavailable, but you can use anything at all. Unlike vinegar pickles, these are going to get cloudy no matter what kind of salt you use. With rhubarb, that makes for a pink, cloudy, pretty brine but with vegetables with plainer color schemes, the brine will just look cloudy.

So glad to hear it, Dona! Along with snap peas and asparagus, my rhubarb pickles are at the top of my pickle list for this year (so far). Glad you love them, too! We got through a quart in like two days. Then I made a half-gallon, and those are long gone, though there’s no more rhubarb to be found around here anymore.

I’ve already eaten almost a half gallon by myself already today. No one will try them! It’s probably just as well.

I love this recipe. People put vinegar and sugar and all sorts of things in pickles but these are just right for me. I may reduce the salt a wee bit. Other than that, I’m so glad no one else wants to give them a try.

Oh man, I am totally trying these this year. I made a sweeter refrigerator version from Kim Ode’s Rhubarb book last year (it goes with a kale salad recipe -so good!) and I found they were a good sub for celery in lots of things. Didn’t think to try a fermented version 🙂

I started 2 half gallon jars of these 3 days ago. As of yet, neither jar has any bubbles coming up to the top like my other ferments usually do…. Does this mean I did something wrong? I followed the recipe completely except for the green garlic (I just had the regular garlic). Did yours bubble?

These aren’t vigorously bubbly. More along the lines of a cucumber than a cabbage. If you taste them in a few days and they aren’t more acidic, then something went wrong, but I would be surprised if that’s the case. The green garlic definitely does help the fermentation along in this one, so you might want to give it some extra time.

Thanks, Amanda! I appreciate your time and wisdom! I have tasted them and they have lost a lot of the sourness of the rhubarb and are more salty than anything I guess… My tastebuds are not as sensitive as some. I do like them and can’t wait for the 2 weeks so I can start eating them! Thanks for sharing!

So- once its ready, do you close the jar and put in the fridge? Or are these supposed to stay at room temperature in the jar. Quite a basic question, but it isn’t clear to me as this is my first fermentation experience, it’s been super fun! i think the rhubarb is ready, its been over 2 weeks, but it is still quite crunch.

I tried your promising recipe. The rhubarb is now in the jar for over a week, and I am very exited to start trying in a few days. I started to get a little worried as I am seeing some kind of flakes appearing on the chopped rhubarb pieces. Is this part of the process? (I am not so experienced with fermentation yet)

Hi Amanda, thanks for your reply and the reference, it was really helpful. I just can’t be completely sure, but how can you be when so many micro-organisms are transforming your food into something…… REALLY tasteful! And my body seems perfectly happy with it. It certainly added to my enthusiasm about fermentation, and I am really starting to think about brining it to the next level (although I am still a rookie)… the farmer’s market in the south of Holland. Although it is still a premature idea, I can’t stop thinking about pickling it 😉 Any tips about that? Or is it just start doing it again…

I’m so glad you’re loving your ferments! I have no retail experience with vegetable ferments so I can’t offer you any tips on that, unfortunately. Here in the US, there are legal requirements that vary by state. That may be a great place to start for you.

Best of luck! I’m hoping to visit Holland later this year, so maybe I’ll see you at the farmers’ market :-).

Good morning Amanda!
I have a technical question for you.
I made these rhubarb pickles two weeks ago which are ready to eat. I used a sea salt brine and used Fido jars. About a week into the fermentation process I noticed tiny white spots on the top of the rhubarb. More spots appeared but for the most part they seemed to have disappeared. Do you know what this would be and are these safe to consume?
The brine was 1 tbsp sea salt to 2 cups of water.
I appreciate your help!!

Just set up a quart of these…well kind of. Only had two rhubarb stalks from CSA so added a bunch of young turnips (sliced), a couple of radishes (also sliced) and a garlic scape (cut into 1″ pieces). I have high hopes…

I was about 10 days into my 2-week ferment on these and they were starting to taste really good, but then yesterday I discovered mold growing on top of the brine. Should I throw it all out? Skim off the mold?